Vocabulary

How parents can help children build English vocabulary

Vocabulary quietly limits everything else — reading, writing and speaking all stop at the edge of the words a child knows. It is also the easiest thing for a parent to help with.

Which words are worth the effort

Not the unusual ones. The highest-value vocabulary is the band of words common in books but rare in conversation: however, describe, increase, although, compare, suggest.

Children pick up everyday speech naturally from the world around them. They rarely pick up this written-register vocabulary without help, and it is exactly what school texts and exam questions are built from. A child who knows these reads with far less friction.

How many words at a time

Fewer than most people expect. Five to eight words properly learned and reused beats twenty met once. A long list feels productive and mostly is not — the words that survive are the ones met repeatedly in different contexts.

Why spacing beats effort

Reviewing a word today, then in three days, then next week, produces far better retention than the same total time spent in one sitting. This is one of the most consistently supported findings in learning research, and it is easy to use at home: keep reviews short and let a gap open between them.

Practically, that means five minutes before each lesson on the words from the last one — not a half-hour session on Sunday.

What works, at home

Use the feedback list

Every lesson’s feedback names the words worth revising. Ask what each means, then ask for a sentence. You do not need English yourself to do this.

Reading, above all

Books expose children to words conversation never will. This is the single largest source of vocabulary growth and nothing substitutes for it.

Use the word yourself

If your child learned enormous, use it during the week. Hearing it in a real context is worth several drills.

Word families, not single words

decide, decision, decisive. Learning the family multiplies the return on one piece of effort.

Recognising is not knowing

A child can recognise a word in a sentence long before they can produce it. Both matter, but production is the harder skill and the one that shows up in speaking and writing. Always push for a sentence rather than a definition — that is the difference between a word they have met and a word they own.

How long this takes

Vocabulary accumulates slowly and then becomes suddenly visible. There is no shortcut and no dramatic week. The children who end up with strong vocabularies are almost always the ones who read regularly over years, which is unglamorous advice but the honest kind.

Questions parents ask

How many new English words should a child learn each week?

Around five to eight properly learned and reused beats twenty met once. Retention depends on repeated encounters, not list length.

Which English words should I teach my child first?

Words common in books but rare in speech, such as however, describe, increase and although. Everyday conversational words are usually picked up naturally.

Are flashcards useful for vocabulary?

They help for reviewing words already met in context, particularly if reviews are spaced out. They are much weaker as a first encounter with a word.

My child forgets new words quickly. What helps?

Spacing. Short reviews at increasing intervals work far better than one long session, and using the word in conversation during the week helps more than re-reading it.

Lessons with a teacher

If your child would benefit from working on this with someone, every new family gets one free lesson. One-to-one, no card required, from $7 per lesson afterwards.

Book a free first class See how our vocabulary lessons work

Last reviewed: 22 September 2026